I'm really dreading this election year...
Mom keeps saying she is going to stop watching the news, because it causes her to worry so much, but the next thing I hear is the news. She has it on most of the day. She fights depression and it only makes her more depressed and have a bad attitude towards everything. If I go in sit in the same room with her she will let me change the channel, but she continues to talk about how bad everything is. Even though I live here and am her full-time care giver I can't sit and watch TV all day. Does anyone else have this issue?
Blackhole, I think you're right about the cycle of bad news, especially that coming from Puerto Rico. The extent of the devastation is unimaginable. Add to that the mass shootings, plus the political fiasco and shananigans...
Sometimes I watch This Old House just for relief; I can't understand what the tradesmen are doing with all the new and probably expensive devices for renovated houses, so I'm lost in seconds, and that confusion replaces the anxiety of the cable news channels and their endless parade and endless obsession with the playpen that the White House has become.
Windy, after my house was burglarized a decade ago, I investigated various types of alarms. One I discovered would have been very effective, but would also have disrupted life in the surrounding areas. It didn't just alarm, it played some kind of trumpeting sound accompanied with strobe lights. I can't remember what it was called.
It probably would have scared all the four-legged wildlife away as well.
But the audaciousness of it is comparable to the audaciousness of the political performances on center stage now. ...sometimes like entry of a Roman legion....cue the mikes, lights, cameras, grab the podium, turn one way or another while letting hair flop in face. It's like an orchestrated comedy.
Wonder how much was deleted by ad min.
My 87 yr old mom gets more upset by the local "Crash and Burn" news. She wants me to get them a security alarm system. She can hardly use a phone. I can just imagine the fun we'd have with silence codes, false alarms to the cops, resetting issues. Ain't gonna happen.
I don't hear that much about what she's heard/seen on Fox News anymore, though. I think her hearing's gotten worse, she isn't following what they say, or she just doesn't care.
I used to get her books from the library, and she doesn't even want that anymore, either.
She does get the newspaper two days/week, and she does still think she's a financial guru and try to tell us things from the financial news.
Anyway, this appears to be an old thread but I'll weigh in anyway. My mother used to watch CNN and then she would start in with the "isn't it awful" talk. Sadly, our tv news stations thrive on everything bad, and now the internet news is the same. I no longer watch any news on tv - and lately have stopped reading on line articles. I glance at the headline, that's it. It is so depressing for anyone to hear only the bad, over and over. News seldom reports anything from other countries, or anything good. No wonder the US docs prescribe so many antidepressants. We are being led into the swamp of violence, hate and sex by the media.
The only draw back would be that Dad would call me saying things like the schools were closed in Chicago because of the snow. Well, that's interesting since I have no children and live in Virginia :P But to Dad it was important. I wish I had more patience to understand why that was so urgent to him back when he was still with us.... [sigh]
You can change your behavior and reaction to your mother's television news addiction. I think it's perfectly acceptable to tell your mother that you do not share her interest in bad news. If she won't quit bad news, and her depression is getting worse, maybe the only solution is get rid of cable television. I wish you lots of luck!
The news is easy for them to understand (as opposed to more complicated shows and dramas with fast talking and fast movements). Since the news focuses on nothing but the sensational and mostly bad you have to expect it feeds into their negativity.
Seniors are very conscious of the news which is not very cheerful. They lived during a time when there was much more patriotism, less strife and violence in America then there is today. With advance technology, all the bad stuff from all over the world is at their fingertips and the media loves to report it.
To UK ears that sounds like a wild exaggeration, but on the other hand how would I know - is it so?